


a pink comforter

by bracari



Series: Not so Dickensian [1]
Category: Dickensian (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-24
Updated: 2016-01-24
Packaged: 2018-05-16 01:43:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5808523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bracari/pseuds/bracari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur really wants something and needs Meriwether to get it.</p><p>Dickensian modern AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	a pink comforter

Meriwether was being insufferable as usual. Thick-headed, selfish, calculating...Why Arthur put up with him, he'd never know.

Turning slightly and watching the way he flexed his biceps as he closed his hand around Arthur's arm, he actually...erm...had a notion.

"How come it's always me doing the asking?"

"She won't do as I say!" Arthur complained.

"She won't do as you say because you don't ask nicely and think it's your right to have everything." Meriwether replied.

"She doesn't like me."

Meriwether stared "Now you're just being stupid."

They were opposite Amelia's room and could hear Honoria's voice. She was probably narrating something from that 'special story you are never ever to read because it is too smart for your idiotic brain'.

"C'mon... Do this for me?" Arthur begged. He even pouted, and that was his special weapon.

"What do I gain from this?"

Arthur glared "Apart from the obvious, I'll make it worth your while tonight."

Meriwether sighed as Arthur's lips pressed against his jaw. "You are incorrigible."

Arthur giggled against his Adam's apple and shoved Meriwether towards the door "Hum, yes. But you love it. Now, stop using those complicated words."

Meriwether knocked and the commotion stopped.

"Come in!" said his darling sister from inside. Arthur flattened his back against the wall and his boyfriend entered the lion den. Well, lionesses. Skirt-wearing, sock-hoarding, shrill-sounding lionesses.

"Dear Amelia! How are you this fine evening?" Meriwether asked, leaning against the doorway and cocking his hips. This wouldn't work.

Amelia's reply rung clear "It's the afternoon." This wouldn't work at all.

Meriwether shifted slightly. "Well, the sun is nearly setting. Speaking of which, isn't it a wonderful time to go out?"

Arthur groaned. That hadn't been smooth at all.

"Is Arthur outside?"

Meriwether scoffed, and alright that had sounded sincere. It wouldn't help him, however. Right, erm. Time to man up. Toughen up and face them. Become the-

"Arthur, you can come in now!" Honoria sing-songed. Well, there really was not helping it.

"Honoria, how are you?" he greeted from Meriwether's side. "I didn't know you were here. Again."

"I live here too." she replied, monotone, under a pink quilt with a laptop perched on her knees, very close to topping over. She didn't even deign to stop typing and Arthur personally thought that was very rude.

"I want the car keys."

"What for?" Amelia asked, not deigning to lift her eyes from the equations.

"Haven't you heard Merry? It's a fine evening and we want to go out."

"Where are you going?" Arthur groaned "Come on, Amelia. I just want to visit a bar Merry talked about."

Amelia turned in her chair and whispered "Is it a gay bar?"

Arthur spluttered "No!"

"I want to go."

"You're not going."

"Then you're not getting the keys."

Arthur groaned again. "Amelia, you can't go to a gay bar!"

"Why? I have, before. My assignments are done for the week and Honoria could come too."

Meriwether sighed by the door. Arthur threw his arms up.

"Amelia! For the last time, neither you nor Honoria are gay!"

"Well, I'm bi. And Honoria is my best friend and I need company."

Arthur gritted his teeth. "You're not going."

"Alright. You're not going either, so shut the door on your way out and please don't make so much noise upstairs."

Arthur gaped and Meriwether chuckled. "I do not make that much noise!"

Honoria, for the lack of a better word, hollered. "Oh yes you do! You make the neediest noises."

Meriwether perked up, evidently pleased. The prick.

"How do you know it's not Meriwether doing them?" he asked, aiming for confrontation. The three remaining occupants shared a look. And then started laughing. Even Amelia, and wasn't that just what he needed? Storming out, he made sure to jostle his useless boyfriend, who was leaning against the door and pretending to gasp for air. He would not stand for this. He would give them the cold shoulder the entirety of the evening if he had to. Next day even! Who did they think they were? He was-

"Arthur! Arthur!" Meriwether hissed behind him, stomping up the stair as well.

"I will not stand for humiliation!" he huffed, entering his own bedroom.

Meriwether laughed "It's really true, though." Arthur spun around.

"I am not needy!" he replied, sticking his finger on Meriwether's chest.

Meriwether drew nearer and the warmth irradiating from him made Arthur feel a bit light-headed.

"You're currently touching my chest." Arthur's throat was quite suddenly very dry. "You see how this undermines your argument?"

"Oh." "Yes." Meriwether's voice was velvety and filling him head to toes. Arthur's blood felt like it was expanding under vessels. "Sorry" "No, I quite like you needy."

Having his mouth captured in a kiss, Arthur briefly wondered why.

 

* * *

 

The two girls, as Arthur sometimes put in big capital letters even though he was younger than either of them, were lounging in Honoria's bed. Tucked up against each other and sharing the comforter Amelia had been envying for the entirety of the afternoon, they read in unison from the file Honoria had spent the most of the past three hours writing in. Sometimes studying was indeed a chore, and Amelia more than once wanted to read up on her friend's story and just forget about arithmetic for once.

"Their dialogue is so strange...Wait, they are removing their waistcoats? Which time is this set in?" Amelia commented, squinting at the screen.

"The nineteenth century."

Amelia laughed. "Why would you do that?"

"Well...Meriwether sometimes speaks like he's from the past." Honoria answered.

"What do you mean?"

"It's mostly things like 'rather' and 'indeed I have taken most of the afternoon in the most invigorating romp with my amiable chap.'"

Amelia spluttered "Meriwether does not say that!"

"You're right. He almost never says 'rather'." Honoria replied deadpan to Amelia's amusement only.

"Alright, he does say the other stuff." Amelia conceded "But then, why Arthur? Apart from the obvious, that is."

"He's a self-centred, macho-bullshitting prick. He's a perfect fit for the nineteenth century!"

Amelia frowned, shifting on her spot.

"He only says those stuff because he's really insecure, Honoria. That's not really fair."

"I know. But it's not my fault he is so offensive." Honoria said, saving the document in an encrypted folder. "At any rate, he's better than Meriwether."

"But Meriwether's charming!"

"Amelia, Meriwether is charming only to Arthur and himself." Honoria said. At the lack of response, she looked at her best friend "I mean, Arthur is better when he is with Meriwether because he feels so frightened by you. No, don't contradict it. He just...maybe he should be a bit weary of Meriwether. And that's all I am going to say." She then got up and set the laptop on the desk.

"Is that why you make Meriwether so terrible in your story?"

Honoria smiled wryly. "Well, that's just me taking the piss." she informed her, unplugging the power chord and twisting it methodically.

As Amelia laughed warily, she added "Just forget what I said. I am wrong about people too, sometimes."

Amelia raised her eyes and her smile did not quite reach it. "I hope you're right. For my brother's sake."

**Author's Note:**

> First of a series of booklets imagining the Havishams' life in current times. Will eventually have backstory of how Arthur and Meriwether met, why Honoria is living with the Havisham's and just what they do.


End file.
